So Sony noticed that we do a lot of book giveaways here, and they offered to let us test run a sleek, shiny, silver Sony Reader PRS-505. What’s the green angle to a Sony Reader? We can save a lot of resources if electronic readers capture the market: paper, resources to make paper, ink, transportation, space, etc. Make sure to read Smart Planet for a thorough eco analysis of the reader, though. Anyway, being avid readers, we decided to give it a shot, because, to be entirely honest, we can’t stop reading! So I opened up the box about a month ago (yep, I’ve been using it that long to be sure about what I say below), and I was blown away. Seriously. The screen is so much like paper — I couldn’t believe it. As a result, I decided, then and there, to try to make a video so you can see what I see.

It seems like there’s a new, cutting-edge technology in the limelight everyday and today is no exception. You’ve heard of CSP — concentrated solar power, right? Well Sopogy has been in R&D for several years perfecting their MicroCSP technology. They developed the above pictured application for commercial, industrial, and small utility uses. MicroCSP takes traditional, large scale, open faced, desert, parabolic trough CSP panels and shrinks them down to 25% of the size. The trough is between 12 and 18 feet long and is meant for distributed energy solutions from 200 kW to 20 MW. It can be used on-site, too, whether on a roof or adjacent to a building.

The innovators of this new technology, if they get it into production, may just be the green building revolutionaries of tomorrow. At the end of the week, MIT engineers published research of new technology showing that the sun’s energy could be harvested from a large area, such as a window, and concentrated at the edges by solar cells. With this so-called luminescent solar concentrator, the potential for low-cost electricity seems almost within reach. Technically, here’s how it works:

Just a little over a year ago, on May 4, 2007, Greensburg, Kansas was smashed by a tornado that pretty much decimated everything. Since that time, the city has made news all over the world for its ambitions to rebuild everything in an environmentally-friendly way. City buildings larger than about 4000 sf will be LEED Platinum, etc. So this building, 547 Arts Center, is an example of the green reconstruction process going on in Greensburg. 547 Arts Center is the first building certified as LEED Platinum in Kansas and has some incredible green elements — not to mention three small wind turbines twirling away above the roof line.

I’ve not blogged about this interesting and innovative Rotating Tower, which was designed by David Fisher of Dynamic Architecture, because critics have downplayed the concept saying it’s not capable of being built. But now comes news that the Rotating Tower is not only on the cusp of construction in Dubai, but it’s in advanced design phase for Moscow and intended for New York. Let me say that again: Fisher intends to design a Dynamic Tower for the Big Apple! If you haven’t heard about it yet, make sure to watch the above video. Here’s the general idea:

Atlantic City Convention Center has just signed a 20-year agreement with Pepco Energy Services to have a 2.36 megawatt solar roof installed on the building. When completed by the end of this year, the project is projected to be the largest single-building solar energy project in the United States. That’s 13,321 photovoltaic panels covering roughly two-thirds of the building AND a savings of roughly $4.4 million in electricity costs over the 20-year deal.